Thrakwood
Thrakwood is an Official GemStone IV Document, and it is protected from editing.
Solhaven Flora: Thrakwood
Found in and around Solhaven, these bushes are difficult to find despite being prolific, mostly because they look almost identical to wild snowberry bushes. Despite its name, they seem to have nothing to do with thraks. People have experimented with thrakwood and thraks, but, while the creatures will eat them, they do not seem overly fond of them, and they also are not adversely impacted by proximity or ingestion of the bush or its components.
The bush itself is typically modestly sized, so while you can use thrakwood in carving, it's usually for small items, as larger items would require numerous bushes. The wood is soft and not fit for combat, but one can use it for inlays and other decor. The wood color (both bark and heartwood) is a somewhat sickly grey with bilious-hued veining. The small, oval leaves have wavy-toothed margins and are a bright green, and the flowers are tiny, pink bells that group densely together in sporadic clusters. There is no medicinal use for these components, and while they can be used in perfumes, tisanes, or distillations, the scent and flavor have been described as bland, non-descript, and "just like a... plant."
In the autumn, the flowers turn to berries. Thrakberries are a bright white, again like the snowberries they blend in with, but they have a pale pink tinge to them, and when one cuts the tiny berry open, it is a vivid crimson. The berry is incredibly sour, but it is edible by people and animals alike (bears, owls, and mice are known eaters of the berry). Indeed, some say that the name "thrakwood" and "thrakberry" derives from the face the person makes when eating one without benefit of cooking in copious amounts of sugar (in other words, they look a bit weird -- somewhat like a thrak).
Some denizens of Vornavis claim the thrakberry will keep away vampires, demons, and various forms of undead, but there is no evidence of this being more than rumor and folk tale.